Important announcement

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MyEDC

    Technical Notes 2025, Issue 10 - Car Parking Charging

    • Report by:

      Heather Holland, Executive Officer – Land, Planning and Development

    • TN Number:

      010-25

    • Subject:

      Car Parking Charging

    • Responsible Officer:

      David Gear – Place & Business Development Manager

    • Publication:

      This Technical Note will be published on the Council’s website following circulation to Members. Its contents may be disclosed or shared outwith the Council.

    The purpose of this Technical Note is to respond to a query raised at the meeting of the Place, Neighbourhood & Corporate Assets Committee 17 October 2024 in relation to revision to orders to enable changes to charging in town centre car parks.

    At the meeting of Council 19 March 2024, a range of budget measures were agreed, which included business cases for On Street Charging, Charging Period Revisions, Increase to Parking Charges & Introduction of Charging.

    As part of the implementation of this decision revisions to orders are now being progressed. The Place, Neighbourhood & Corporate Assets Committee on 17 October 2024 approved Report PNCA/040/24/IH to progress the introduction of a revision to the times of operation of charging within car parks. The revision to existing orders is subject to formal consultation process and presented to a future Place, Neighbourhood & Corporate Assets Committee for approval.

    It was agreed at the Place, Neighbourhood & Corporate Assets Committee 17 October 2024 that a Technical Note would be provided in relation to a question asked as to whether it is possible to equate car park turnover to economic activity.

    A wide range of social, economic, and environmental factors, trends and conditions (both micro and macro) influence the performance of town centres. Assessing the health and performance of town centres requires detailed exercises that explore a  range of factors. Town centre health checks are undertaken as part of work to support Local Development Plans and sub-strategies. Footfall counts and town centre vacancy rate information is collected more regularly and presented in 6 monthly HGIOS reports.

    The approved East Dunbartonshire Parking Management Plan (PMP) (Read the Parking Management Plan) notes that responses to the consultation held on the East Dunbartonshire Economic Development Strategy in 2016 indicated that a lack of parking in town centres was an issue for town centre users and local business owners. To increase turnover of the car parks and increase footfall in town centres, the Council introduced a car park charging scheme to seven town centre car parks in July 2016.  The car park charging scheme was amended in June 2018 when two further car parks were added to the scheme.

    The PMP noted that at the time of drafting consultation responses had raised concerns that removal of free parking in the Pay & Display car parks has reduced town centre footfall and harmed local businesses. Analysis was carried out at that time to determine what effect the car park charging scheme had had on local town centre footfall, the results were detailed in the PMP which showed no significant correlation between charging and footfall from earlier phases of charging. 

    There has been no further analysis carried out since this time or following price increases although as noted in paragraph 1.5 town centre health checks and footfall counts have continued.  It should be noted that footfall counts are a better indicator as there could have been changes in users’ mode of transport who visit the town centres therefore caution should be exercised in attempting to directly translate car park usage into economic activity.